China’s military has accused its top general of undermining Xi Jinping’s command authority, suggesting the investigation into Zhang Youxia announced on Saturday is not just about corruption allegations but about ensuring the Chinese leader’s powers.
Zhang, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, and Liu Zhenli, another member of the CMC and chief of staff of the People’s Liberation Army, “severely crushed and damaged the chief responsibility system,” the military’s official newspaper PLA Daily said in an editorial published on Sunday.
Under the Chinese constitution, the state and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leaders chair the CMC and have supreme decision-making power over the military. This “chairman responsibility system” is designed to secure the party’s complete control over the armed forces.
An editorial in the PLA mouthpiece said the two generals “seriously fueled political and corruption problems that impinge on the absolute leadership of the (Communist) Party over the military and threaten the foundation of the Party’s rule”.
The comments highlight the PLA’s vital importance in Xi’s expected quest for a fourth term, which the party must confirm at its next congress in 2027.
Since the party gained power through civil war and most of its founders fought in those wars, it views control over the armed forces as inevitable.
“The military is the only organization in China that has a history of defying Party leaders,” said Dennis Wilder, a Chinese military expert and former head of China analysis at the CIA, citing criticism of Mao Zedong’s policies by then-Defense Minister Peng Dehuai in 1959 and an alleged coup attempt against Mao by top general Lin Biao in 1971.
Wilder said that while Zhang had won the battle with He Weidong, the CMC’s second vice chairman and member of a rival faction who was ousted the previous year, “Xi probably feared that (…) Zhang was too powerful in the military. Given that Xi wanted a fourth term in office, he would fear that Zhang might lead an effort within the party to oust him”.
According to a Defense Ministry statement released Saturday, Zhang and Liu are being investigated for “serious discipline violations and violations of law,” the Communist Party code for corruption that is also commonly used in political purges.
This announcement surprised many observers. Zhang was seen as a close confidant of Xi, whose seniority and war experience made him crucial to the implementation of the Chinese leader’s reforms to transform the PLA into a world-class force on par with the US military.
The investigations into Zhang and Liu have hollowed out the CMC, leaving Zhang Shengmin, the political commissar in charge of investigating corruption, the only active member other than Xi.
Lyle Morris, a PLA expert at the Asia Society Policy Institute, said the references to violations of the presidential responsibility system showed that Zhang Youxia had too much power independent of Xi herself.
Morris said, “The PLA and Xi have emphasized (the chairman responsibility system) as a central tenet of PLA discipline in recent years. Therefore, uncovering such a violation shows that Zhang was out of step with Xi’s chain of command.”
James Char, an assistant professor at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, who has been tracking Xi’s PLA purges for a decade, said: “I highly doubt that Zhang Youxia or anyone else in the regime would have had the audacity to engage in open confrontation against Xi Jinping.”
But he said Zhang’s downfall may be related to factional politics and “mountaintop-ism”, the habit of regional leaders building their power bases, which has plagued the party since its guerrilla days.
The “Shaanxi Gang” led by Zhang and the “Fujian Clique” which included him and other now purged members were rivals within the CMC.
“It makes no sense that Xi only removes the leader of one group and not another. What he has done now is help ensure that no particular faction becomes too powerful,” Char said.
“Zhang should have seen this day coming,” he said, pointing to a previous wave of investigations into corruption in the PLA’s weapons development and procurement system, which Zhang led until 2017.
Jae Ian Chong, associate professor of political science at the National University of Singapore, said that Zhang’s arrest had sparked speculation of a plot against Xi, but there was no concrete evidence that he was in any imminent danger.
It is clear, Chong said, that “Xi remains with significant reach and is unopposed or at least impossible to oppose within the system.” “This extends to the princes who were previously considered untouchable and those considered close to them.”
One way to try to understand how disruptive Zhang’s arrest could be to the Chinese system, Chong said, would be to see if it caused delays to important meetings and official agendas in the coming weeks.
Morris said the fact that Xi took such a dramatic step showed that he had the full support of the party and was confident that he had consolidated his power over the military.
“This is not a sign of weakness for Xi, but of strength,” Morris said. “There will likely be a backlash from Zhang’s power base against Xi. In some eras of Chinese history, this would raise concerns about a coup. But Xi was confident enough in his hold on power to withstand such a backlash.”
